Are you suggesting they shouldn't have done whatever they could have, to land the best player in the world? I thought it was brilliant, the turning point in the franchise obviously.

Yes, they should have tried to win. That's the whole point. Losing on purpose should not be rewarded. I can guarantee you if a team pulled this stunt in this day and age the NHL would actually have the guts to take away the #1 pick, which they should have done to Pitts in 1984.

Let's suppose Montreal keeps Markov out of the lineup. Markov's not gonna be happy about spending two years re-habbing just to be a healthy scratch. Even if he doesn't say anything his agent does. Markov sure as heck wouldn't want to be back in Montreal next year after the bush league stunt and demands a trade. So too do Cole, Gionta, Price, Subban, Gorges, etc etc since they're all disgusted in their team's management.

The media smells blood and they do some digging. Eventually someone in the front office fesses up, the league investigates and figures out that yes, Markov was healthy and was kept out of the lineup in favour of Chris freakin' Campoli just so Montreal would have a better chance to lose a few extra games. PG tries to argue that Campoli is awesome and Markov wasn't ready, despite 19 doctors saying otherwise.

Gary Bettman dinged the New Jersey Devils a pick from signing Kovalchuk to a perfectly acceptable contract. What do you think he'd do to the Habs for making a mockery of about 15 games in an all-out effort to lose? The sad part is no matter what they do they're not going to end up in last overall, Columbus has that locked up. So is it really worth it to try to slightly increase your odds of holding on to # 3 and not falling to # 4 or # 5? Hell no.